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| The American Stamp Club of Great Britain |
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The American Stamp Club of Great Britain was founded in 1954. There are over 400 members from all over the world. |
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| John Paul Jones |
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| by John Edwards |
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It is a little known fact that the American War of Independence was not waged entirely on the American Continent. In 1779 a Scotsman brought the American War of Independence to Britain.
 John Paul was born in 1747 in Kirkcudbright, Scotland. He sailed as a cabin boy to Virginia at the age of 12, and he later worked as a mate on a slave-trading brigantine. After the master and chief mate died of fever, he took charge of the ship for the return run to Britain. Later he was commander of a vessel in Barbados, West Indies, where in 1772 he killed a mutinous sailor.
Fearing that there would be local sympathy for the dead man he fled the islands and changed his surname to Jones.
He joined the fledgling (American) Continental Navy, and gained great notoriety by outwitting and destroying British frigates across the Atlantic and along the British coast. On 23 September 1779 he was commanding the American ship Bonhomme Richard off Flamborough Head near Bridlington when he engaged the British man of war Serapis. His vessel suffered massive damage, but when asked to surrender he replied with the immortal words: "I have not yet begun to fight".
The battle blazed for another three hours and Jones finally triumphed, capturing the Serapis and sailing off in her while his own ship, the Bonhomme Richard, sank to the bottom of the North Sea.
When peace came, Congress awarded him a gold medal. But he became disillusioned with the US Navy after the American Revolution because of lack of promotion and the decline of the Navy. He accepted an offer by Russia's Catherine the Great to become a rear admiral in the Imperial Russian Navy. He fell from favour there because of political intrigue, and his departure was hastened by a scandal.
 He finally died in 1790 in Paris a broken man following unproven accusations of rape and a lack of recognition by the new United States government. A French friend had him buried in an alcohol-filled lead coffin, believing that his body might one day be returned to the United States. In 1905 the United States did remember him, and his well-preserved body was removed from the Paris cemetery. He was eventually re-interred in 1913 in the crypt of the US Naval Academy chapel. This gave rise to the midshipman's ditty 'Everybody works but John Paul Jones'.
He was first commemorated in 1936 (Scott #790) as one of America's naval heroes. In 1979 the United States issued a commemorative stamp (Scott #1789) marking his contribution to the country's fight for independence. This stamp's history is as chequered as the man it honours. Quantities of printer's waste for this stamp have appeared on the market, including imperforate stamps, perforated or imperforate gutter pairs or blocks and shifted or missing colours, mostly of doubtful origin.
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| Reprinted with permission from The Mayflower, journal of the American Stamp Club of Great Britain |
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